Doc's Research
by AllisonReader
Summary: Doc Hudson knows his type, race car, the last thing the town needs, and he's done the research to prove it. Except, somehow, he's won everyone in town over.


Once Lightning was all hooked up to Bessie he retreated into his clinic, he wanted to know just who this Lightning McQueen was. Right now all he knew was that he was a race car and an arrogant one at that. One who didn't think he needed to take responsibility for his actions. He wanted to know just who exactly was staying in his town for almost the next week.

He started with looking up articles about him online and printing them off. The more articles he found about the young racer the less pleased he was about having him in town. He watched a few clips from his previous races, especially the race the kid was just in, as well as interviews with him.

He found the red racer to be a brash, arrogant, cocky idiot, who screamed I'm a rookie, in attitude. He wasn't helping himself in anyway either; in his first season he had already fired three crew chiefs and had his entire pit crew quit on him. He didn't want to think about how they must have been treated for them to quit.

While it was obvious that he could race, having an almost an inert natural talent, if he continued on the way he had been, he wouldn't be able to find anyone _to_ race for. Not to mention the stupid stunts he had pulled in his most recent race that could have been avoided if he had a crew chief he'd listen to.

Those were such stupid rookie moves that he was amazed that he had still ended up tying and not in a hospital somewhere. He was lucky his blown tires hadn't made him crash. The kid had a lot of spunk doing those kind of things, but that didn't mean it would get him anywhere.

When Mater barged in claiming that McQueen was done after an hour, he was in disbelief and knew it couldn't be done right. He left his research unfinished to see what the kid had done.

While he wasn't done with researching yet, he felt like he had a better idea of just who this car was and it didn't surprise him that he'd try to rush through it, just like the stupid stuff he did in his last race. So when he was refusing to start from scratch, he offered up a race. He figured the kid probably couldn't turn on dirt, there was certainly nothing that suggested otherwise.

He was right, and he took great delight in hearing him complain about being beat, and ending up in the cactus patch, it was like sweet music to him.

He continued his research for a bit, before going to bed, noting all his observations from both the articles and what he had seen of him in town. He had printed off the articles that caught his attention the most and had circled certain things in red that stood out.

The one thing he constantly found himself circling was rookie. The other thing that concerned him was the fact that he had fired three crew chiefs and that his pit crew quit.

It didn't speak well for the kid. When the kid did get to his race he wouldn't have a team behind him, but that wasn't his problem though. The kid was too much of a jerk to allow people to work with him and too arrogant to take advice from those people. Those qualities wouldn't get him far unless he could learn to tone them down.

He was not about to be dragged back into the racing world because of some hot shot rookie who didn't care about anyone but himself.

When he found the rookie in his garage he added more to the list, like nosy, star struck, and trespasser. He hadn't had to deal with that for a long time, he wasn't going back and there was nothing the kid could do to change his mind.

When he finally finished paving, he didn't leave. He was getting everyone's hope up by buying tires and doing other such things. He had to get this car out of his town, the people here, were starting to get attached; when he was just going to leave and never think of them again.

So he phoned the press that morning and by the evening they made it to town. It was already too late though, everyone was attached. Sally was smitten with the young racer, Mater had decided that he was his best friend. Who knows what else everyone thought of him.

Much to his displeasure, he was thinking of going back; not for the kid though, no, he was going for everyone else, or at least that's what he told himself.

He had to admit, in the end the punk had actually done a good job with the road, and _had_ helped everyone fix their neon. Not to mention he did buy something from everyone. He was not falling for the kid's charm that he seemed to put over everyone. But by early next morning, he had made up his mind to go back, to go help the kid, all because he helped the town a little, and had somehow completely won everyone over in the little under a week he was here.

So, he did something he never thought he'd do again, he put on his racing colours.

Everyone in town, but Sally, Red, and Lizzy were coming. The kid had an entire crew on the way for him.

Once they got there, he could see the kid was out of it, a danger to others with how distracted he seemed. It was a good thing there was only three of them racing.

This was not the racing he had seen in the footage he saw while researching him. He almost hit a wall and the kid's driver asked him if he was okay. He wasn't, but as soon as he spoke, the kid visibly brightened and after a quick pit stop for gas, the kid was racing again. Not that distracted stuff from before, but more like the footage he had seen.

He was impressed at how he handled what was thrown at him. He felt a swell of pride as the kid figured out what he had been telling him at the Butte, to take first place, but what made him speechless was when the kid chose not to come in first and instead went and helped his competitor.

That's when he knew the kid really wasn't that bad, he had just chosen to ignore the changing signs.

The kid was still nosy, would always be a rookie to him, but was learning to tone down his negative traits, and he could, much to his surprise, actually work with people.

Well it looked like he had done the impossible, the kid had gotten him back into the racing world, somewhere he never thought he'd be again.

* * *

This thought of Doc researching Lightning has been a personal head cannon of mine for years, to explain how Doc knew that Lightning needed a crew chief.


End file.
